System and method for archive verification

ABSTRACT

Embodiments provide systems and methods for archive verification of media in a library. A method of archive verification may comprise loading a specified media into a drive at intervals, sending one or more commands to the drive, wherein the drive attempts to read the specified media or data on the specified media in accordance with the one or more commands, collecting data associated with the specified media from the drive and determining the readability of the specified media or data on the specified media.

CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATION

This application is a continuation of, and claims a benefit of priority under 35 U.S.C. 120 of the filing date of U.S. patent application Ser. No. 12/025,436, by inventor Robert C. Sims, entitled “SYSTEM AND METHOD FOR ARCHIVE VERIFICATION” filed on Feb. 4, 2008, the entire contents of which is hereby expressly incorporated by reference for all purposes.

TECHNICAL FIELD OF THE INVENTION

This disclosure describes various methods and systems for archive verification. More particularly, embodiments of the disclosure include methods and systems for verifying the readability of library media and data stored on library media.

BACKGROUND

Data represents a significant asset for many entities. Consequently, data loss, whether accidental or caused by malicious activity, can be costly in terms of wasted manpower, loss of goodwill from customers, loss of time and potential legal liability. To ensure proper protection of data for business and legal purposes, many entities back up data to a physical storage media such as magnetic tapes or optical disks. Traditionally, backup would occur at each machine controlled by an entity. As the sophistication of network technology increased, many entities turned to enterprise level backup in which data from multiple machines on a network is backed up to a remote library. Typically, a library includes a variety of components which include a plurality of media for data storage. In one embodiment, the plurality of media may comprise multiple magnetic tapes. Centralized data backup has the advantage of increased volume, efficiency and redundancy.

In many systems, the data to be backed up and backup commands are sent over a network from multiple machines on the network to a library. In many instances, the data to be backed up and the backup commands are routed to the library through a switch.

One example of a library commonly used in enterprise backup systems is a magnetic tape library. A magnetic tape library can comprise components such as tape cartridges (containing magnetic tape), robots, tape slots and tape drives. A typical magnetic tape library contains multiple cartridge slots in which tape cartridges can be stored. Tape cartridges, commonly referred to as tapes, are physically moved between cartridge slots and tape drives by a robot. The robot is controlled by commands received from the host devices on the network. When specific data is required, a host device determines which cartridge slot contains the tape cartridge that holds the desired data. The host device then transmits a move-element command to the robot and the robot moves the tape cartridge to a tape drive which reads the desired data from the tape cartridge.

In a SCSI tape library, devices that are part of the library are typically addressed by target number. Thus, each drive and robot of a tape library typically has a target number. Cartridge slots, on the other hand, are addressed by element numbers that are used by the robot to locate the slots. Because the robot also places tape cartridges in the drives, each drive is also associated with an element number.

Components of a library are subject to wear and other forms of degradation. The degradation of library components can deleteriously affect the reliability of the library. For example, degrading tape cartridges may exhibit an increasing number of soft errors resulting from corrupted media sections, lost or incorrect data, bit flips, damaged or strained tape sections or other problems or issues. The degradation of a tape cartridge or other media can culminate in the failure of that tape cartridge or media. For example, a tape cartridge or sections of media may be completely unreadable, thus a hard error or errors may occur.

SUMMARY

Embodiments provide systems and methods for archive verification of media in a library. A method of archive verification may include loading a specified media into a drive at intervals, sending one or more commands to the drive in response to which the drive attempts to read the specified media or data on the specified media, collecting data associated with the specified media from the drive and determining the readability of the specified media or data on the specified media.

Embodiments of methods and systems for archive verification of media contained in a library can include a system comprising a controller and a set of computer instructions executable by the controller to implement the above-described method. In a further embodiment, computer readable media may contain computer instructions operable to implement the above-described method.

Embodiments of methods and systems described above allow the readability of media in a library to be monitored such that the degradation of media in a library can be detected. Data on degraded media may be transferred to a different media and the degraded media replaced, preventing the loss of data.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE FIGURES

A more complete understanding of embodiments of systems and methods and the advantages thereof may be acquired by referring to the following description, taken in conjunction with the accompanying drawings in which like reference numbers indicate like features and wherein:

FIG. 1 is a diagrammatic representation of one embodiment of a library;

FIG. 2A-2C are diagrammatic representations of embodiments of a system utilizing a library and having a monitoring appliance;

FIG. 3 is a flowchart illustrating a method for monitoring library components according to one embodiment; and

FIG. 4 is a diagrammatic representation of one embodiment of a controller which can be used in a monitoring appliance.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

Preferred embodiments are illustrated in the FIGURES, like numerals being used to refer to like and corresponding parts of the various drawings.

As used herein, the terms “comprises,” “comprising,” “includes,” “including,” “has,” “having” or any other variation thereof, are intended to cover a non-exclusive inclusion. For example, a process, process, article, or apparatus that comprises a list of elements is not necessarily limited only those elements but may include other elements not expressly listed or inherent to such process, process, article, or apparatus. Further, unless expressly stated to the contrary, “or” refers to an inclusive or and not to an exclusive or. For example, a condition A or B is satisfied by any one of the following: A is true (or present) and B is false (or not present), A is false (or not present) and B is true (or present), and both A and B are true (or present).

Additionally, any examples or illustrations given herein are not to be regarded in any way as restrictions on, limits to, or express definitions of, any term or terms with which they are utilized. Instead these examples or illustrations are to be regarded as being described with respect to one particular embodiment and as illustrative only. Those of ordinary skill in the art will appreciate that any term or terms with which these examples or illustrations are utilized will encompass other embodiments which may or may not be given therewith or elsewhere in the specification and all such embodiments are intended to be included within the scope of that term or terms. Language designating such nonlimiting examples and illustrations includes, but is not limited to: “for example”, “for instance”, “e.g.”, “in one embodiment”.

Embodiments provide a system and method for archive verification. Archive verification allows the degradation of media in a library to be monitored such that degraded media may be replaced or removed from the library and data on degraded media to be transferred before it is damaged, corrupted or lost. Archive verification can comprise loading media into a drive and reading data from the media to verify that the media and data on the media can be read. In one embodiment, media can be loaded into a drive and read according to a verification policy. For example, tape media may be placed in a drive and read every 90 days. As part of verifying that media and data on media can be read, read errors or other verification data associated with library media can be monitored. By monitoring library media in this fashion, the degradation and reliability of library media can be monitored, allowing unreliable or unacceptably degraded media to be identified, thus allowing for data on the unreliable or degraded media to be transferred or otherwise backed up and the degraded media replaced, enhancing the reliability of the library and proactively preventing data loss.

FIG. 1 is a diagrammatic representation of one embodiment of a tape library, as would be understood by one of ordinary skill in the art. Library 100 can comprise drives 140 a-140 e, media changer 125 and associated robot 130, import/export element(s) 145 and slots 135 a-135 j. Drives 140 a-140 e can read/write data from/to magnetic tape (contained within cartridges), eject tape cartridges and perform other operations. Slots 135 a-135 j store the magnetic tape cartridges when they are not in a drive and robot 130 moves the magnetic tape cartridges between drives 140 a-140 e and slots 135 a-135 j. For example, robot 130 may move a tape cartridge stored at slot 135 a to drive 140 b so that data can be read from the tape cartridge. It should be noted that some libraries may employ a single robot or multiple robots in an expandable or modular configuration.

Library media, such as, for example, backup media such as tape cartridges, backup hard drives or any other media, may contain a flash or other memory in which data may be recorded. This flash memory may be disparate from the memory used as storage for data sent over a network for storage at the library. One term for such flash memory is Medium Auxiliary Memory (MAM) and data stored in MAM may be referred to as MAM data. MAM data for a cartridge may regard the cartridge itself, such as the amount of data read from the cartridge, the size of the cartridge, the load count of the cartridge, etc. In general, MAM has three sections: a medium section containing data written by the manufacturer, a device section containing data written by one or more devices, such as, for example, drives, and a host section containing data written by applications such as, for example, backup applications.

The medium section may contain data from the manufacturer such as the size of the cartridge, the date of manufacture, compatibility information or other data. The device section may contain data from devices which have accessed the cartridge. For example, the device section may contain a load count counter which may be incremented by drives which have loaded the cartridge, read or write error counts, the amount of data read or written, the amount of data contained in the cartridge or other data. The host section may contain data from applications, such as, for example, backup or other applications, which have accessed the cartridge, such data may regard, for example, the type of backup data stored on the cartridge, the backup date or other data. MAM data may be accessed by a Read Attribute command: in response to a Read Attribute command, a drive or other library device may read MAM data and return MAM data to a requesting device. Examples of a Read Attribute command can be found in “SCSI Primary Commands-4 (SPC-4)”, (Project T10/1731-D), Revision 2, 15 Sep. 2005, propagated by the T10 Technical Committee of the InterNational Committee on Information Technology Standards (INCITS), which is hereby incorporated by reference.

A Verify command is a command which can be used to verify the readability of tape cartridges (or other library media such as laser discs, hard drives or any other media) and data stored on tape cartridges. A verifying device, which may be, for example, a controller, sends a Verify command to a drive and in response, the drive determines if the cartridge can be read by attempting to read the cartridge. If the drive is able to read the cartridge, the drive returns an indication that the cartridge was successfully read (in one embodiment for example, by returning a command complete to the verifying device). If the drive is unable to read the cartridge, the drive may return an indication that the cartridge could not be read. The inability to read a cartridge or data on a cartridge may be the result of a hard error or the failure of the Verify command. Thus, a Verify command can be used to verify that a particular cartridge in a library can be read. Examples of a Verify command can be found in “SCSI Block Commands-3 (SBC-3)”, (Project T10/1799-D), Revision 6, 24 Jul. 2006, propagated by the T10 Technical Committee of the InterNational Committee on Information Technology Standards (INCITS), which is hereby incorporated by reference.

A Read command is a command which can be used to read tape cartridges (or other library media such as laser discs, hard drives or any other media). That is, a requesting device sends a Read command to a drive and in response, the drive reads data stored on the cartridge and the read data is returned to the requesting device. Thus a Read command can be used to retrieve data from a tape cartridge in a drive.

As part of the process of retrieving data, it can be verified that a particular cartridge and data on the particular cartridge can be read. For example, if a Read command is sent to a drive and data from a particular cartridge is successfully read, that particular cartridge and data on that particular cartridge can be read. On the other hand, if that particular cartridge or data from that particular cartridge cannot be read, then the cartridge has degraded. The inability to read a cartridge or data from a cartridge may be the result of a hard error or a failure of the Read command. Thus, a verifying device can use a Read command to verify the readability of cartridges and data on cartridges. For example, a verifying device can send a Read command to a drive and if data is returned, the readability of the particular cartridge read is verified. On the other hand, if one or more read errors is returned or if data cannot be read from that particular cartridge, the particular cartridge may be degraded. Examples of a Read command can be found in “SCSI Block Commands-3 (SBC-3)”, (Project T10/1799-D), Revision 6, 24 Jul. 2006, propagated by the T10 Technical Committee of the InterNational Committee on Information Technology Standards (INCITS), which is hereby incorporated by reference.

A Log Sense (LS) command is a command which is used to obtain data associated with a particular drive. A LS command is sent to a particular drive of a library and in response, the particular drive returns data associated with the drive and cartridges accessed by the drive. For example, such data might include: read errors, write errors, utilization and performance data, data regarding the data written and read to a media, media loaded, detail tables or other data. Examples of a LS command can be found in “SCSI Primary Commands-4 (SPC-4)”, (Project T10/1731-D), Revision 10, 21 Apr. 2007, propagated by the T10 Technical Committee of the InterNational Committee on Information Technology Standards (INCITS), which is hereby incorporated by reference.

An archive verification engine can provide archive verification for one or more libraries. In an embodiment, an archive verification engine can be a component of a monitoring appliance which can be a Read Verify Appliance (RVA). In one embodiment, the archive verification engine is a set of computer instructions which can be executed by a monitoring appliance controller to verify library media. The archive verification engine can further be associated with or comprise a verification policy. The verification policy can specify archive verification parameters such as the duration between verifying cartridges, the acceptable number of read errors or other parameters. In one embodiment, the verification policy is stored at the monitoring appliance.

In one embodiment, a monitoring appliance verifies cartridges (or other media) in a library according to a verification policy. In one example, the verification policy may stipulate that individual cartridges are to be verified periodically, such as every 90 days. Thus, as stipulated by the verification policy, the monitoring appliance may verify cartridges every 90 days. The monitoring appliance may keep track of how much time has elapsed since cartridges in a library have been verified and if the monitoring appliance determines that 90 days have elapsed since a particular cartridge was last verified, the monitoring appliance may verify that particular cartridge. Reading data on a cartridge causes cartridge wear, thus a period between verifications may be chosen which minimizes wear while allowing for satisfactory verification of media. One such period may be 90 days, but other periods may be chosen. Periods between verification may be the same for all media in a library or may be different for one or more media or classes of media. For example, older tape cartridges may be verified more often than newer tape cartridges.

In one embodiment, the monitoring appliance is able to determine the time elapsed since a particular cartridge was verified because the monitoring appliance queries the state of the library over time and uses data regarding the state of the library to track cartridges and the operations associated with the cartridge. Tracking cartridges and maintaining information regarding cartridges is described in U.S. patent application Ser. No. 11/801,809, entitled “METHOD AND SYSTEM FOR NON-INTRUSIVE MONITORING OF LIBRARY COMPONENTS,” and U.S. patent application Ser. No. 12/024,755, entitled “MEDIA LIBRARY MONITORING SYSTEM AND METHOD,” issued as U.S. Pat. No. 7,908,366, both of which are hereby incorporated by reference. In another embodiment, all cartridges in a library or a known subset of cartridges in a library are verified periodically. For example, a periodic verification window can be allocated for periodic archive verification and all cartridges in a library or a known subset of cartridges can be verified during the verification window. Such verification may utilize all or most of the drives in a library. Because all cartridges in a library or a known subset of cartridges in a library are verified, the monitoring appliance can verify cartridges based on an internal clock or other timing device.

FIG. 2A is a diagrammatic representation of a system 200 a in which a plurality of hosts 202 a-202 d have access to library 100 over network 205. Network 205 can comprise the Internet, a SAN, a LAN, a WAN, a wireless network or any other communications network known in the art. Hosts 202 a-202 d are coupled to library 100 via network 205 and switch 207. Similarly, library 100 can communicate with switch 207 over any suitable communications link or network known in the art and can use additional protocols such as iSCSI, TCP/IP, or other protocol known in the art. Switch 207 is connected to monitoring appliance 220.

Switch 207 is connected to library 100. Thus switch 207 can forward Verify, Read, LS or Read Attribute commands from monitoring appliance 220 to library 100. Switch 207 receives the verification data generated in response to the commands from library 100 and forwards the verification data to monitoring appliance 220 which may compare the verification data against requirements contained in a verification policy and may store the verification data in a repository. By comparing the verification data against requirements of a verification policy and by comparing verification data against previous verification data regarding a particular cartridge stored in a repository, monitoring device 220 can monitor the degradation of cartridges. Because monitoring appliance 220 verifies cartridges by sending commands to a library or library devices such as drives or other devices, monitoring appliance 220 does not need to intercept commands or responses from network 205 to verify cartridges. Thus, in one embodiment, monitoring appliance 220 can be an out-of-band appliance. This allows monitoring appliance 220 to be a non-intrusive device which does not monitor or interfere with commands from and responses to hosts 202 a-202 d. Consequently, monitoring appliance 220 can be a compartmentalized device which can be coupled to a switch.

While a particular network topology is shown in FIG. 2A, a monitoring appliance may be used in other network topologies to collect data associated with a library or library components. FIGS. 2B and 2C are diagrammatic representations of example network topologies in which a monitoring appliance can be used to collect data associated with a library or components of the library.

For example, FIG. 2B is a diagrammatic representation of a system 200 b having a network topology in which monitoring appliance 220 is coupled to media changer 125 and coupled to drives 140 a-140 e through switch 207. Thus, monitoring appliance 220 can communicate with (in one embodiment, for example, by sending commands to or receiving data from) media changer 125 and drives 140 a-140 e. By way of further example, FIG. 2C is a diagrammatic representation of a system 200 c having a network topology in which monitoring appliance 220 is coupled to drives 140 a-140 e through switch 207 and is coupled to media changer 125 through network 209. Thus, monitoring appliance 220 can communicate with media changer 125 and drives 140 a-140 e. In system 200 c, networks 205 and 209 can be different types of networks. For example, network 205 might be a fibre channel network whereas network 209 might be a IP network.

While shown as a physical media library in FIG. 2A-2C, library 100 can be a virtual media library that is a virtual representation of one or more physical media libraries as presented by switch 207, a library controller or other component. Examples of library virtualization are described in U.S. patent application Ser. No. 10/704,265, entitled SYSTEM AND METHOD FOR CONTROLLING ACCESS TO MULTIPLE PHYSICAL MEDIA LIBRARIES, and U.S. patent application Ser. No. 10/703,965, entitled SYSTEM AND METHOD FOR CONTROLLING ACCESS TO MEDIA LIBRARIES, both of which are hereby incorporated by reference herein.

To verify a particular cartridge in a library, the monitoring appliance (for example, monitoring appliance 220 of FIGS. 2A-2C) requests that library 100 load the cartridge to be verified in one of drives 140 a-140 e, and sends a Verify command to the drive. A particular drive may be reserved for all verification operations. In response, library 100 loads the particular cartridge into a drive and the drive attempts to read data stored on the cartridge. In the course of reading data or attempting to read data on the cartridge, the drive may register read errors. Registering read errors increments a read error counter within the drive. Such a read error counter may be a buffer or other memory which is incremented when the drive registers a read error in the course of reading or attempting to read a cartridge. Read errors may be soft errors or hard errors. Soft errors may include flipped bits, corrupted data, damaged media sectors or other problems or issues. Read errors may also be hard errors indicating cartridge failure or damaged media sections. In one embodiment, the read error counter logs soft errors and hard errors in separate sections in the read error counter.

If the drive is able to read data stored on the cartridge and so verify the readability of the cartridge, the drive returns an indication of a successful verification to monitoring appliance 220. Such an indication may be, for example, a command complete message. If, however, the drive is unable to read data stored on the cartridge or the cartridge, the drive may return an indication of a failed verification to monitoring appliance 220. The inability to read a cartridge may be the result of a hard error or the failure of a command.

In addition to sending a Verify command to library 100, monitoring appliance 220 may send a LS command to the drive in which the particular cartridge was loaded. In response to the LS command, the drive returns data associated with the drive being verified. Such data may include the number of read errors logged by the drive and may also include: utilization and performance data, data regarding the data read from the media, detail tables or other data. In one embodiment, data returned in response to a LS command or other command may be used to determine which sections of the media registered soft errors or could not be read by, for example, tracking the count of blocks. Such functionality may be implemented at the monitoring appliance or other device.

To verify one or more cartridges, monitoring appliance 220 may also utilize a Read command in much the same way that the Verify command was utilized as described above. The drive will, however, return the data read from the cartridge. Receiving read data from a drive serves to confirm that the drive is able to read a cartridge and data on a cartridge. Furthermore, it is possible to compare checksums against the data returned to ensure that the read data is correct. Other data verification algorithms may be performed on the returned data.

To verify the particular cartridge, a Read Attribute command may also be issued the drive. In response to the Read Attribute command, the drive returns MAM data from the particular cartridge in the drive.

Based on the verification data (which may be, for example, data used to determine the reliability of media, such as data returned in response to a Verify command, Read command, LS command, Read Attribute command) returned from the drive monitoring appliance 220 can verify if the particular cartridge can be read and sections of the cartridge that can or cannot be read. According to one embodiment, in the context of monitoring appliance 220, a subroutine running on a controller in monitoring appliance 220 can correlate data returned in response to an LS command (i.e. the number of read errors registered by the drive) with the cartridge such that the number of read errors (for example, soft errors or hard errors) registered by a drive while reading or attempting to read a particular cartridge can be correlated with that particular cartridge. In one embodiment, because a monitoring appliance 220 can track which cartridge is in a drive when it issues a Verify command, a Read command, a LS command or other command, a subroutine running on the monitoring appliance can correlate the data received in response to the various commands to the particular cartridge.

Monitoring appliance 220 can further save verification data over time in a data repository which may be part of or extend to monitoring appliance 220. If the verification data for a particular cartridge exhibits an upward trend in read errors over time or if read errors are increasingly prevalent in a particular section of the cartridge, based on replacement rules in the verification policy, monitoring device 220 may issue a warning to a user (virtual or otherwise) that the cartridge has degraded such that it is no longer reliable and that data on the cartridge should be transferred before it is corrupted or lost. Alternatively, monitoring appliance 220 may automatically begin a data transfer from a tape showing decreased reliability to another tape.

FIG. 3 is a flow chart illustrating one embodiment of a method for archive verification. According to one embodiment, the method of FIG. 3 can be implemented as a set of computer executable instructions stored on a computer readable medium at, for example, monitoring appliance 220. The set of computer executable instructions can, when executed, verify library media in a non-intrusive manner. At step 355, monitoring appliance 220 instructs a library to load a cartridge to be verified in a drive and issues a Verify command or Read command to the drive. The library loads the particular cartridge into a drive and the drive attempts to read data on the cartridge. If a Verify command is sent to the drive, verification data indicating whether the cartridge or data on the cartridge can be read is returned (such as, for example, a command complete or a read failure indication or equivalent). Such verification data may further include data associated with reading the cartridge. If a Read command is sent, and data stored on the cartridge is successfully read, data from the particular cartridge may be returned. If the cartridge or data on the cartridge is not successfully read, verification data indicating that data or the cartridge cannot be read is returned.

At step 360, MAM data on the particular cartridge is collected by sending a Read Attribute command to the drive in which the particular cartridge is located. In response, the drive reads the MAM data from the MAM (which may be, in one embodiment, flash or other memory) on the particular cartridge and the drive returns the MAM data. At step 365, drive data from the drive which read the particular cartridge is collected by sending an LS command to the drive. In response, the drive returns drive data associated with the particular cartridge. Such data may include read errors (which may include, for example, the number of soft errors logged by the drive or hard errors) associated with a particular cartridge, utilization and performance data, data regarding the data read from the particular cartridge, detail tables or other data.

As part of steps 355, 360 or 365, data returned from the drive may be stored in a repository located at, for example, monitoring appliance 220. Collected data may also be correlated with cartridges. For example, data returned in response to a LS command may be correlated to the corresponding cartridge.

At step 370, verification data is compared against a verification policy. Based on the comparison of the verification data against the verification policy, it can be determined if the particular cartridge is unacceptably degraded and requires replacement. For example, if the verification policy specifies an upper-bound read error threshold and the number of read errors listed in returned verification data corresponding to a particular cartridge exceeds the read error threshold, the verification policy may require that the data on the particular cartridge be transferred and the cartridge replaced or removed from the library.

In other cases, the comparison may include a statistical analysis of the verification data and comparing the results of such analysis to the verification policies. For example, statistical analysis or other forms of mathematical analysis can be applied to verification data regarding read errors and corresponding to particular cartridges. Based on the statistical analysis, which may be done in accordance with a verification policy, the degradation of a cartridge may be determined and the cartridge may be retired and data on the cartridge transferred.

In one embodiment, if a Read command is used to read data, the data returned as part of a successful read can be compared against the data written to the cartridge. For example, when data is written to a cartridge, redundancy check data (for example, a cyclic redundancy check, checksum or other redundancy check) can be generated using the data written to the cartridge and the redundancy check data stored. When data returned as part of a successful read is returned to the monitoring appliance, redundancy check data may be generated from the received data and a redundancy check can be performed against the redundancy check data generated when data was written. In one embodiment, the redundancy check can be utilized to identify soft errors caused by, for example, corrupted data.

To achieve archive verification, a specific drive of a library may be dedicated to archive verification such that the drive is generally only used for archive verification. In other embodiments, to minimize possible conflicts between archive verification and other operations performed by a library, drives may be dedicated to archive verification for periods of time (for example, a verification window). For example, a specific drive may be dedicated to archive verification for a two hour verification window on certain days. In a further embodiment, all the drives in a library are dedicated to archive verification during a periodic verification window. For example, all the drives in a library may dedicated to archive verification during a verification window that repeats monthly.

FIG. 4 is a diagrammatic representation of a monitoring appliance controller 400 (“controller 400”). Controller can include a processor 402, such as an Intel Pentium 4 based processor (Intel and Pentium are trademarks of Intel Corporation of Santa Clara, Calif.), a primary memory 403 (which, in one embodiment, may comprise RAM, ROM, Flash Memory, EEPROM or other computer readable medium known in the art) and a secondary memory 404 (which, in one embodiment may comprise a hard drive, disk drive, optical drive or other computer readable medium known in the art). A memory controller 407 can control access to secondary memory 404. Controller 400 can comprise a communications interface 406 (which, in one embodiment, may comprise fibre channel interface, Ethernet port or other communications interface known in the art) to connect controller 400 to a switch or other network interface such as, for example, switch 207 of FIGS. 2A-2C. An I/O controller 412 can control interactions with the switch. Similarly, an I/O controller 414 can control interactions over I/O interfaces 408 and 410. Controller 400 can include a variety of input devices. Various components of controller 400 can be connected by a bus 426.

Secondary memory 404 can store a variety of computer instructions that include, for example, an operating system such as a Windows operating system (Windows is a trademark of Redmond, Wash. based Microsoft Corporation) and applications that run on the operating system, along with a variety of data. More particularly, secondary memory 404 can store a software program 430 that comprises an archive verification engine. Secondary memory 404 can also store a verification policy which may be part of software program 430. Secondary memory 404 can also serve as a repository for verification data which may be saved over time. During execution by processor 402, portions of program 430 can be stored in secondary memory 404 and/or primary memory 403.

Verification data can be stored and used to monitor the degradation of cartridges or other media in a library. Verification data can be stored in memory, in a database or according to other data storage schemes to allow for easy access.

Embodiments can also be implemented with respect to libraries of media other than magnetic tapes. For example, the library can comprise a plurality of optical disks (i.e., an optical jukebox) or removable hard drives. Other libraries which may be verified according to embodiments of above described systems and methods can utilize a combination of different storage media such as hard drives, magnetic media or optical media.

While embodiments have been described with particularity, it should be understood that the embodiments are illustrative and that the scope of the invention is not limited to these embodiments. For example, while the above described systems and methods have been described in the context of a monitoring appliance and utilizing a monitoring appliance for archive verification, computer instructions implementing embodiments of the above described methods can be run on one or more hosts connected to a library over a network to achieve archive verification. For example, a host may send commands over a network to a host and receive returned verification data over the network. By way of further example, while embodiments disclosed above have been disclosed with regard to Read Attribute commands, Verify commands, Read commands and LS commands, other commands may be used for archive verification. Many other variations, modifications, additions and improvements to the embodiments described above are possible. It is contemplated that these variations, modifications, additions and improvements fall within the scope of the invention as detailed in the following claims. 

What is claimed is:
 1. An appliance for archive verification, comprising: a network interface operable to send commands over a network and receive data from the network; a processor coupled to the network interface; and a computer readable media storing computer instructions executable by the processor to: access a verification policy specifying criteria for media to be verified according to the verification policy; determine a set of media to be verified according to the verification policy; for each of the media in the set of media: load the media into a drive of a media library; send one or more commands to the drive to instruct the drive to read the media in accordance with the one or more commands; collect data associated with the media from the drive; and determine a readability of the media based on the collected data and the verification policy.
 2. The appliance of claim 1, wherein the media library is a tape library.
 3. The appliance of claim 1, wherein sending one or more commands to the drive comprises: sending a Read Attribute command to the drive; and sending a Read command to the drive.
 4. The appliance of claim 1, wherein sending one or more commands to the drive comprises: sending a Read Attribute command to the drive; and sending a Verify command to the drive.
 5. The appliance of claim 1, wherein collecting data associated with the media comprises sending a LS command to the drive.
 6. The appliance of claim 1, wherein determining the readability of the media comprises an analysis of read errors associated with the media.
 7. The appliance of claim 1, wherein loading the media comprises sending a command to a library controller of the media library to move the media from a storage slot to the drive.
 8. A method of archive verification, comprising: determining a set of media of a media library to be verified according to a verification policy; for each of the set of media performing a verification process further comprising; loading the media into a drive of the media library; sending one or more commands to the drive instructing the drive to read the media in accordance with the one or more commands; collecting data associated with the media generated by the drive; and determining a readability of the media based on the collected data and the policy.
 9. The method of claim 8, wherein the media library is a tape library.
 10. The method of claim 8, wherein sending one or more commands to the drive comprises: sending a Read Attribute command to the drive; and sending a Read command to the drive.
 11. The method of claim 8, wherein sending one or more commands to the drive comprises: sending a Read Attribute command to the drive; and sending a Verify command to the drive.
 12. The method of claim 8, wherein collecting data associated with the media comprises sending a LS command to the drive.
 13. The method of claim 8, further comprising: determining if the media is exhibiting decreased reliability; and in response to determining that the media is exhibiting decreased reliability, issuing an alert based on the decreased reliability.
 14. The method of claim 8, further comprising: determining if the media is exhibiting decreased reliability; and in response to determining that the media is exhibiting decreased reliability, transferring the data from the media to a different media based on the decreased reliability.
 15. The method of claim 8, wherein determining the readability of the media comprises an analysis of read errors associated with the media.
 16. A system for archive verification comprising: a media library storing a plurality of media, the media library comprising a drive and a library controller; a monitoring appliance in communication with the media library, the monitoring appliance is configured to: access a verification policy specifying criteria for media to be verified according to the verification policy; determine a set of media from the plurality of media to be verified according to the verification policy; for each of the media in the set of media: load the media into the drive of the media library; send one or more commands to the drive to instruct the drive to read the media in accordance with the one or more commands; collect data associated with the media from the drive; and determine a readability of the media based on the collected data and the verification policy.
 17. The system of claim 16, wherein the media library is a tape library.
 18. The system of claim 16, wherein sending one or more commands to the drive comprises: sending a Read Attribute command to the drive; and sending a Read command to the drive.
 19. The system of claim 16, wherein sending one or more commands to the drive comprises: sending a Read Attribute command to the drive; and sending a Verify command to the drive.
 20. The system of claim 16, wherein collecting data associated with the media comprises sending a LS command to the drive.
 21. The system of claim 16, wherein determining the readability of the media comprises an analysis of read errors associated with the media.
 22. The system of claim 16, further comprising computer instructions executable to: determine that the media is exhibiting decreased reliability; and issue an alert based on the decreased reliability.
 23. The system of claim 16, further comprising computer instructions executable to: determine that the media is exhibiting decreased reliability; and transfer the data from the media to a different media based on the decreased reliability. 